Women claimed victory in all six competitive categories at this year’s National Book Critics Circle Awards, The LA Times reports. The winners were announced at the annual event held yesterday in Manhattan. Launched in 1975, the prestigious honors are determined by a jury of critics and book-review editors.
The fiction prize went to Joan Silber for “Improvement,” a novel about a single mother in Harlem who gets involved with her ex’s criminal activities.
Frances FitzGerald took home the nonfiction prize for “The Evangelicals: The Struggle to Shape America,” an historical look into the Evangelical movement all the way from the Puritan era to the 2016 presidential election.
The autobiography prize was awarded to novelist and filmmaker Xiaolu Guo for “Nine Continents: A Memoir In and Out of China.” Guo was raised by her illiterate grandparents in a fishing village shack on the East China Sea.
The prize in biography went to Caroline Fraser for “Prairie Fires: The American Dreams of Laura Ingalls Wilder,” a look into the life of the “Little House on the Prairie” author.
Carina Chocano received the prize in criticism for her essay collection “You Play the Girl: On Playboy Bunnies, Stepford Wives, Train Wrecks, & Other Mixed Messages.” She was first inspired to write the book a decade ago while working as a film critic and feeling frustrated by the roles available to women.
The poetry prize was awarded to Layli Long Soldier for “Whereas,” an exploration of the the United States government’s treatment of Native American peoples and tribes.
